Chapter 13: The Back Stairs

Winslow's POV

Lorna opened the hotel door in a cream robe with her hair down and her eyes already wet.

"You came," she said.

"Mother said you weren't answering."

"I was sleeping."

On the table behind her stood a glass of wine and an open bottle of pills.

I walked past her and picked up the bottle.

It was a sleeping prescription, filled that morning, thirty tablets inside.

None were missing.

"Winslow, don't be cruel," she whispered. "I've had a terrible day."

"You've had a nice day. The glass is clean and the bottle is full."

She sat on the bed and cried.

I had watched her cry for eighteen months, and I had never once looked to see whether she had tears.

"The DA's investigator called me," I said. "I'm giving a statement on Monday."

"Saying what?"

"That you stood at the foot of my stairs with a lighter."

She stopped crying.

It did not fade. It simply stopped.

"You'd put me in prison," she said. "Daniel's wife."

"If you did it."

"I was frightened. I was holding it for the light."

"You told me Georgina was out the back."

"I thought she was."

"You were looking at the stairs when you said it."

Lorna lifted her eyes to mine.

They were dry, and they were calm, and I knew them better than my own.

"You weren't supposed to go back in," she said.

The room got very quiet.

"What?"

"I mean it was dangerous. You could have died, Winslow."

"You said I wasn't supposed to go back in."

"I said it badly."

She stood and came toward me with her hand out.

"The smoke is quick, you know. I read that. She wouldn't have felt anything. She'd have gone to sleep."

I took a step back.

She followed me.

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